


Run To Me, Lover

by SJtrinity



Series: I Need You To Run To Me [2]
Category: The Pacific (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - X-Men Fusion, M/M, Period Typical Attitudes, what happened stateside: the story
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-13
Updated: 2020-05-13
Packaged: 2021-03-02 23:09:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 17,511
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24164908
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SJtrinity/pseuds/SJtrinity
Summary: "Miss Risely," he said firmly, reaching out and taking one of the snifters from her. "I need you to tell me where Andrew Haldane is." Florence's eyes shifted away and then back again."It sounds worse than it is," she prefaced. Eddie forced himself to not clutch the glass, to not loom over her. Florence stared up at him, a wide, honest gaze. "He and Haney are breaking into an underground military bunker to rescue Bill."
Relationships: Andrew A. "Ack-Ack" Haldane/Edward "Hillbilly" Jones
Series: I Need You To Run To Me [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1743913
Kudos: 7





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I wanted to tell the story of what happened to everyone back home, but didn't really feel like it had a place in the main work. Plus, I got super obsessed with what Jones and Haldane would have talked about when they first met. If you're reading this without having read the main story, it probably won't make much sense, but don't let that stop you. Timeline-wise, this mostly takes place between chapters 16 and 17 of the main work. I don't really know if this should be rated M or not, but I thought I'd play it safe.

_"We've already been through this." He didn't know why the man kept asking him to tell the same damn story. He didn't know why he kept telling it._  
_"I'd like to hear it one more time." His eyes barely crinkled, his lips stayed straight, but the wry amusement was plain on his face. "I swear that there's a purpose to it beyond seeing how you handle aggravation."_  
_Maybe he had an inkling as to why he let himself be talked into it again and again. "Me and some other boys were watching them drive logs downriver." He turned away from him and back towards the river, pointing to where the water narrowed. "We had a game that went along with it, 'cuz we were too dumb and brash to find something better to do with our time. We'd hang out around this bend here, and wait for a log jam to start up. Then we'd try to beat the river pigs to it, cross the jam before they had a chance to break it up." He looked back over; he was watching him talk with the same amount of focused interest that he had shown through each retelling. "One time while we were jumping our way across, one of the drivers caught up with us. Man was quick, hopping across the logs faster than a tern skimming the water. I had the ill luck of bringing up the rear."_  
_"What color was his shirt?"_  
_He shot him a look. "He wasn't wearing a shirt." What in the hell was the point of all these questions? "Anyway, he reached me right before I made it clear of the logs. Took his peavey and walloped me right across the ass. Hook stuck me good and I left a trail of blood all the way home. Pa whipped me for causing trouble and then stitched me up and that's the whole story. Worse wound I ever took, aside from-" and then he remembered. Crouching behind the rock, watching the five of them move further up the hill, Sledge in front heaving falling boulders aside with the same amount of effort a regular man would expend opening a stuck door. He started to turn to yell instructions back to his stovepipe boys, and then something slammed into his helmet and threw him backwards and he reached a hand up and felt-_  
_A hand on his arm, a mellow, low voice. "Let's refocus. I have another question."_  
_"Who'd have thought?" He quipped, strangely relieved. He let that dark shadow of a feeling go, turned back around to face him._  
_"What was the reward, for crossing the log jam?"_  
_"What do you mean?"_  
_"It was dangerous. You and your friends knew it. You chose to risk it despite that. So what did you gain from it?"_  
_He laughed, shook his head. "Nothing. Not a damn thing, 'cept the right to brag."_  
_"Then why do it?"_  
_"Hell, I don't know. At the time the idea of losing face with the boys seemed a fate worse than death. Looking back, we were lucky none of us drowned or ended up crushed beneath the logs."_  
_"You don't seem to regret it."_  
_"No point in regretting it, it's already done. But yeah, I wouldn't try a thing like that for something as no account as bragging rights these days. I don't tolerate that kind of horseplay from any of my men either."_  
_"So what would you cross that river for, these days?"_  
_He stared at him incredulously. "My men. Your five boys especially, if I'm being honest." That got him a warm smile, the corners of his mouth slowly rising up, his eyes steady on him. It lit an unwanted feeling in his chest, a need so often denied it had turned to ire. "Where am I? What is it that you want?"_  
_"You've taken care of them," he almost murmured. "Treated them like human beings. That alone is enough. But I'm not doing it for them."_  
_"Doing what?" He turned away, looked back at the river. He wasn't home, he knew he wasn't really home. He was on Peleliu with his company, or, had they returned to Pavuvu? He couldn't remember._  
_"We'll get to that." This time when he touched him it was on his forearm. He kept his hand there, a warm weight. "Would you mind to tell me the story again?"_

* * *

  
"This it?" The driver asked, turning around and shooting Eddie a look. The man clearly thought he was crazy, and Eddie couldn't blame him. After all, what sane man climbed into a cab and told the driver he didn't have an address, to just start driving and he would talk him through it? And to end up here of all places, in front of a sprawling mansion at the top of a hill, surrounded by forest.   
"Yep," Eddie said. This was it, he knew it in a place deeper than his bones. The house was dark except for a few windows. Eddie stared at them as he pulled out his wallet and paid the man, then grabbed his suitcase and exited the cab. The car pulled away and Eddie ran a hand through his hair, not allowing himself to linger on the tangle of scarred skin over his brow. He straightened his shirt and walked towards the door. The place made sense, he supposed. Charming and somehow simple despite its size. It was like it had been built specifically for the man. Maybe it had for all he knew, he clearly had the money for it. What in the hell was he thinking, coming here? But he remembered his voice, asking him to come, and kept walking forward.  
The door swung open before he reached it, and Eddie's chest tightened with anticipation, but it wasn't him. It was a young woman, long brown hair and lovely wide gray eyes. She gave him a look of open distress.  
"Oh, he's not here, and you came all this way." She bit her lip and glanced back behind her into the house, then turned and looked at him, her clear gaze fastening on his.  
"I was hoping to see Andrew Haldane," he said, looking back.  
"I know. Come in, have something to drink. I'll have to call you a cab, I'm so sorry. Andy's not here."  
_Andy_. "This is the right place?" He clarified, dismissing the disappointment. It was just a temporary bump in the road.   
"Yes, this is Andy's home," she answered, stepping back in the doorway. Eddie moved past her and into the house. The room was big and airy, white walls and large windows and a feeling of space and comfort. "He's away, but I expect him back in a few days. If you can stick around town that long, I'd be happy to let him know you dropped by, although now might not be the best time, considering-" She broke herself off, closed the door and came to stand beside him. "Let's just start with names, shall we?" She said with a self-deprecating smile. She stuck her hand out. "I'm Florence Risely."  
"Florence." He reached out and took her hand. "Might of heard mention of you a time or two. Eddie Jones."  
"Heard mention of," She started to repeat questioningly, then stopped. Her hand tightened on his. Her eyes darted up to his forehead. "Captain Jones?"   
"Just Jones, nowadays." It was easier to say than he thought it would be.  
"Not to Haney," she said, beaming at him now, clasping his hand in both of hers. "And not to them. Give me your suitcase." She reached for the handle and Eddie turned it over to her, bemused. "You'll stay here, of course. Haney will swallow his cigarette when he sees you, and Andy will, Andy," she faltered, trailed off, mouth twisting down in a sudden frown. "Would you like a brandy?" She blurted out.  
"Am I gonna need one?" He tried to say it lightly, but he could feel himself starting to hum, a wire of nervous energy crackling to life all through him.  
"We all will, these next few weeks," she answered frankly. "Myself included." She gestured with her head and her shoulder and Eddie followed her across the room to a glass-doored cabinet. She spoke slowly, hesitant in a way that seemed unnatural for her, as she pulled out a decanter and two glasses, poured them both a measure of amber liquid. "It's been unhappy times here, recently. Andy's been worried about Rom and the rest of them. We all have." It took Eddie a moment to realize she was referring to Burgin; he'd never heard him called by anything other than his last name by the boys. "He's been pulling himself thin trying to watch over them. It's all he's been doing these last few months, really. Haney and I had been trying to convince him to take better care of himself, but then they got Bill." Eddie felt a bolt of pain and shock strike straight into him at her words. Not Leyden. He was the last one that Eddie would have expected to hear hadn't made it. He remembered the last time he'd seen him, grinning around a bent cigarette as he jogged off to join the other four boys at the base of the hill. Florence turned around with a stricken look. "He's not dead," she said quickly, raising her hand out and almost dropping the snifter of brandy that she was holding. "I'm so sorry, I didn't mean that. I meant that they took him."  
Eddie felt like the floor had been ripped out from under him, then slid back in place just in time for him to land hard against it. The small snatches of information that he'd managed to take in weren't nearly enough for him to piece a picture together, work out what he'd walked so carelessly into, his heart pinned to his sleeve.   
"Miss Risely," he said firmly, reaching out and taking one of the snifters from her. "I need you to tell me where Andrew Haldane is." Florence's eyes shifted away and then back again.  
"It sounds worse than it is," she prefaced. Eddie forced himself to not clutch the glass, to not loom over her. Florence stared up at him, a wide, honest gaze. "He and Haney are breaking into an underground military bunker to rescue Bill."

* * *

  
_He had remarkable control. Andy had noted it from the beginning, how firmly rooted his sense of self and place was. No matter what landscape they might be walking through, what subject they might debate, he remained the same. His service uniform was neat and clean, and so was he. He stood straight and held his hands carefully still either behind his back or at his side. He smelled like cheap soap, a faint medicinal scent._  
_But that all changed when he played music. Andy watched his fingers bend and dance over the strings, watched him move through versions of himself as he moved through songs. He didn't sing, but at times he would hum the melody as he played. Was his voice really pitched like that, melodious and nimble? Were his eyes really that shade of blue, was he really drawn as fine and sharp as he appeared? It didn't matter. The man who he was here, in the sanctity of his own mind, was a revelation. That, combined with Eugene's impressions and thoughts of him, was enough for Andy._  
_"It's off-beat, you see?" He said, glancing up from the guitar to shoot him a quick grin. "Leaves the rhythm ragged. It's supposed to get you to your feet. Ain't working, I guess." His focus was back on the guitar, but his sharp, lupine smile remained._  
_"It works," he assured him. "But I won't subject you to that."_  
_"Bullshit," he answered back, changing the pattern mid-song, a quicker tempo, a more drastic syncopation. "You look like you could move, just a matter of finding the right tune." He frowned suddenly, catching himself. Andy felt his carefully tended alarms fighting to push through the safe space he had made for them. They were deeply ingrained all through him, the result of a lifetime of caution, of watching his words and looking away, of vigilance. He knew he should let them through. He didn't have the right to keep those wards pushed back. But the ideal solution would be to encourage an alteration in the pattern._  
_"I played in the woodwinds section in high school," he said, and Eddie looked back over at him. Those burning eyes. "But I don't suppose that would suit a guitar. To play together, I mean."_  
_"They could work," Eddie said thoughtfully. "But we'd both need a mindful touch." There was more than a little reservation in the look he slanted Andy's way. But he looked. "Might sound nice."_  
_"We should try it sometime." He shouldn't have said that, he was taking it too far. "It's been a long time since I've played." He was tiring, that must be why he was letting himself speak this way to a man who was wounded, who needed his help._  
_"Yeah." Eddie looked back down at the guitar, the song changing again, slowing, each note a poignant cry. "Me too."_

* * *

  
"This is as close as we're gonna get."  
Andy blinked, pulled back to the present. He glanced over at Haney, then out the window of the car. Haney had pulled to the side and shut the engine off. It was late, the road to their left empty. To the right, rising ground and thick woodland. Andy looked up the dark slope. "Three miles, give or take?" Haney grunted an affirmative. "No time to waste then." He couldn't feel his mind, but he knew Haney was seething beside him, reminding himself of all the reasons why it was smarter for him to not come along. He turned back to him and put a hand on his shoulder. "Thank you, Elmo."  
"Too goddamn early to be thanking anyone," Haney said gruffly. "You go carefully."  
"I'll be back before sunrise," Andy assured him, and then got out of the car and started walking. An uphill hike of this length would have been nothing to him, ten years ago. But he'd been far too sedentary since then, managing his family's holdings, a gruelingly boring task, and the rest of his time given to his true passion, his school and his students. He set a steady pace, letting his muscles warm up slowly, tracking his way through the undergrowth as best he could in the dark. The night was warm and humid, but not unpleasantly so. But Andy couldn't enjoy it.   
He didn't seem capable of enjoying anything anymore. Not since Haney came home and Andy had been forced to confront how damnably naive he had been, how blinded by his own ideals he had become in his isolation. He'd known they couldn't be trusted from the first, but he hadn't understood how base, how unscrupulous, they truly were. He had made the mistake of brokering a deal with them in good faith. He wouldn't do that again.  
"We can't let them change our goal," Florence had said to him more than once, in the weeks following Haney's return. "We have to hold on to our real purpose." Andy had closed his mind fast against her so she wouldn't see the truth. Their goal had changed the moment the military had chosen to force his hand.  
Peace was still his ultimate aim, but now it would have to come in the form of a forced acquiescence, a bared throat. Held in place by fear and maintained by a hard hand. That other dream wasn't possible; mankind would chose violence time and again. History was the proof of that. What gave him pause was the painful thought of having to demonstrate that harsh truth to the people who had come to rely on him. He could see the expression in their eyes now, Eugene and Florence especially, telepathy was wasted on eyes like theirs. Even more painful were the ones who would try to hide it, bury the hurt. Merriell and Jay and Romus. It was why he had been keeping himself separate, shutting out the susurration of thoughts that he was usually surrounded by. They had been a constant since he was eleven years old, and the ringing silence that he was left with was chilling. He had to remind himself often that this was how it was for everyone; people passed their entire lives in this desperate quiet. But he couldn't shut it out at the moment. He needed to hear them.  
He lowered his walls, let the awareness flow in. Life flared up all around him, pinpricks and bright torches and warm lanterns. He was still a distance away, but he started picking through the minds of the soldiers within the bunker, a violation that he knew he should feel remorse for, learning the facility and the various security measures that he would have to move through.  
It took him nearly two hours to reach the spot where the trees gave way to cleared land. By then he had a hold of them all, his fingers sunk in. They weren't even aware of his touch. He instructed the soldier guarding the entrance to open the gate, instructed the man watching the cameras to leave his post. He walked through the gate and up to the door and the man standing guard there unlocked it and didn't see him. To fully take control of another's mind was an arduous undertaking. But to warp perceptions, to give a harmless command and gently suggest they not think about why: that was as simple as breathing. Andy made his way unerringly down. He knew the bunker like his own home now, knew they had buried Bill in its sub-basement. He passed each soldier unseen. Every door was held open for him.   
Bill was pacing restlessly back and forth across the length of the little room they had stuck him in. He turned with feral intent when he heard the door being unlocked, and took a startled step back when he saw Andy standing there behind the soldier. _Don't speak_ , Andy said to him. He could make them not hear, but it was an additional layer of distortion that he would rather not bother with. _Come with me_. Bill eyed the soldier, standing blankly beside the door and staring at the wall, then exited the room and came to Andy's side. They walked through the facility in silence, and Andy reached out gently with his mind, offered Bill a link. Bill reached back reluctantly; he had always been the least inclined of all Andy's students to share thoughts. It was a quirk of character that Andy found oddly touching, because Bill was also the most unfiltered of all his students. What he thought, he said. What he felt, he felt strongly, unequivocally, and he followed those gut feelings without hesitation. _Did they hurt you?_ He asked him. They had come as quickly as they could, but Bill had still been kept captive for more than a month.  
_No_ , Bill answered, but Andy could feel that he wasn't being entirely honest. They had hurt him, Bill just didn't think it was worth mentioning. The majority of their private conversations together had centered around just that sort of thinking. The fact that pain quite literally made Bill tougher, more durable, had given him a different perspective on suffering. Andy didn't feel the need to change his thinking, but had promoted the idea, which Bill had difficulty accepting, that it wasn't the source of his true strength.  
_I'm sorry I put you in their power_. He didn't try to say anything else. He felt Bill lean in against him for just a moment, the heavy weight of fear and helpless rage that he had been living under, and then Bill let it drop away. That quickly Andy was forgiven.  
_Let's just get the fuck out of here_. Bill gestured up towards a camera, attached to the ceiling in the corner of the hall they were walking down. _Should we do something about that?_  
_No. They'd realize the truth quickly enough, even if we did. And I want them to know. They have to be taught my limits._ Andy tried to filter the darker shades from his thoughts, but the flash of surprise and worry that moved through Bill told him he hadn't managed it well. His control wasn't what it should be, these days. They walked outside and started making their way down into the trees. It didn't take long for Bill to start leading Andy, more sure on his feet, more comfortable moving through the dark. Andy followed behind him, confident that Bill had picked up the trail he had left on his trek up.   
"What've I missed?" Bill asked after several minutes of quiet. They were a decent distance from the facility, but Andy still maintained his grip on the men inside. He wouldn't let them go until they were far from here. "How's it going over there?"  
"The battle for Okinawa is over. The 5th is stationed there, recouping as they prepare to launch their assault on Japan. Burgin, Snafu and Sledge are alive and together." It was the one good thing to be said about the trap that they were still caught in. "I'm going to get them out, Bill. They won't be there for long, I swear it."  
"I believe you," Bill said, and he did, his faith unswerving despite everything that had passed since they last spoke. Andy felt a squeeze of pain around his heart. "How's Jay doing?" The pain deepened.  
"Jay is safe, and doing well," he answered slowly. "He hasn't come back to the estate. He's currently in California." Bill grunted.  
"Yeah. Last letter he sent us was postmarked from there. I just thought, maybe." He stopped, walked in silence for a moment. "He'll get back this way. I'd ask how Haney is, but you smell like cheap cigarettes, and no way Flo's started smoking." Andy chuckled.  
"He's waiting for us in the car. Florence is at home, managing things in my absence."  
"What do you think will happen, when these fatheads figure out what you did?"  
"They'll come for us," Andy answered. He couldn't lie, not about that. "But we'll be ready." He felt Bill clench tight around the core of unflinching tenacity that defined him. He didn't waver or shrink back.  
When they reached the car, Bill walked straight around to Haney's window and leaned in. "Lemme drive, Gunny. I'll get us home in half the time."  
"Get in the back," Haney growled, hardly looking at him. His relief was a barely chained thing. Bill huffed and circled back around to the other side and climbed in. Andy followed after him and Haney started the car and pulled back on to the road.  
They didn't speak. Bill was thinking about home and Okinawa, about the small, quiet room waiting for him and the three men who he'd left sleeping in mud halfway around the world. Haney was thinking about what came next. He was running scenarios through his head, working out what their options were. And Andy was digging more purposefully through the minds of the soldiers inside the bunker. He didn't find anything there he didn't already know. He waited until Haney had put several miles between them and the facility, then let their minds go.   
"Sleep if you can," Haney said to them both. "We're driving straight through."  
"Fuck no," Bill said. "I've done nothing but sit on my ass for the past month. Sleep's not high on my list of things to do to pass the time."   
An hour later, Bill was stretched out in the back seat, breathing deep and slow. Andy brushed up against him fleetingly; too light to know what he was dreaming, but enough to know it was something peaceful. He let himself settle down into his seat. There was no point in fighting fatigue, after all. It was, as Churchill said, simple economy of effort. He closed his eyes, let the car's rumbling motion and the comfort of nearby familiar thoughts lull him to sleep.  
They drove all the next day, only stopping briefly to refuel. The sun was slanting low behind them in the sky when Andy reached out to Florence. She grabbed on to him, fingers winding through his own.   
_We're a few hours out_. He sent her an image of Bill, slouched in the back seat and staring restlessly out the window. _Is everything alright over there?_ Florence was close to bubbling over with something, anticipation and nerves.  
_Yes, just fine_ , she answered. _Only, we have a visitor. He showed up the day after you and Haney left_.  
_A student?_ He hoped that wasn't the case. The situation was far too fraught to bring an inexperienced, scared mutant into the mix. And truthfully, he wasn't in the right frame of mind to do well by anyone so vulnerable.  
_No. Its_. He felt her hesitate, and then she opened herself, a quick flash of memory. A man standing between the two columns of his front porch, a creased brow and bright blue eyes, _I was hoping to see Andrew Haldane_. His accent was stronger than it had been when they had talked together in his mind. His curls were more disordered, half obscuring the large patch of scarred flesh over his right eyebrow. But beyond that, he was just as he had appeared then. Andy held himself still, muffled the pandemonium of emotion that tried to surge up and wrest away control. Why had he come now? Now, when Andy had journeyed further from the person he'd hoped to be than he had ever gone before. Now, when he was incapable of giving himself to anything other than this battle. Of course it would be now, too soon, too late.   
_Don't think like that_ , Florence near snapped at him. _How can you think like that?_ Andy pulled back a little distance from her.  
_I'm glad that he's come_ , he assured her. _Bill and Haney will be pleased_.   
_You're underestimating him_ , Florence said angrily. Andy's thoughts had hit too close to her own wounds. _You're underestimating yourself_. She broke away from him, and Andy looked out the window with a grimace, frustrated with his lack of self-control. He'd hurt her with his careless thoughts. It was why he'd been keeping his barriers up.   
"What's with the face?" He turned around to look at Bill, smiled reassuringly at both him and Haney as he did so.  
"It's good news, simply unexpected. I've just spoken with Florence. We have a guest waiting for us at the estate. Captain Edward Jones."  
"No fucking way," Bill said around a growing grin. "Why?"  
"I invited him. He's a good man." He left it at that. It was the unvarnished truth, and he didn't want to have to explain further.  
"Be damn good to see him," Haney said, a ringing endorsement. Bill filled the rest of the ride home with stories about the captain, most of which Andy already knew. But it was a pleasure to hear them from Bill's stark and admiring perspective, to learn all the small ways that Jones had imprinted himself on to him.  
Andy rebuilt his walls as they made their way up the drive towards the estate, reinforced them as Haney pulled the car to a stop and turned the engine off. He would need to keep them lowered in the coming days, would need to be aware of what might be coming for them, but at the moment he needed them. Bill was chomping at the bit, and didn't wait on them to head straight for the door. Haney placed himself behind Andy and followed after him. By the time he walked inside, Bill was already making his way straight towards a man, sitting in a chair across from Florence. The man stood up to meet him, smiling.  
"Leyden," he said. He gripped his arm, clapped him on the shoulder. "Miss Risely's given me to understand you've gone and gotten yourself in a spot of trouble."  
"Miss Risely, my ass," Bill said. "C'mere, Flo." He wrapped an arm around Florence's waist and pulled her in. "Fucking missed you. Thanks for all the chocolates."  
"Oh, Bill," Florence said, knocking their heads together lightly. They had always had a unique relationship, frank and open. They had little in common, but liked and admired each other without reservation regardless.   
"Skipper," Haney said, moving around Andy and shaking Eddie's hand. "Civvies suit you."  
"You're a goddamn liar," Eddie said with a sharp grin. "They don't suit either of us just yet, but it'll come." He looked over at Andy, one quick and thorough sweep. "Andy?" He asked, like he was trying the word out. He stepped forward, held out a hand. His smile was still in place, but it had an edge to it now, brittle and skittish. Andy knew all the years and hard lessons that the man had fought against to come here. "Pleasure to meet you in the flesh."  
"Thank you for coming, Eddie," he said, taking his hand and shaking it briefly. "I was confident that you would recover, but it's good to have that knowledge confirmed. You look well." More than that, he looked whole. He was exactly as Andy remembered him; shaped by a discerning hand, crisp and fine, every feature drawing the eye on to the next. He was a spare inch taller than Andy, and attractively rangy with it.  
"Right," Eddie answered, his eyes a guarded question. "Yeah. You got a good place here."  
"Yes. I'd like to talk more, but unfortunately there are some pressing issues that need to be immediately addressed. Please, consider yourself at home." He turned away from Eddie's troubled expression, from Florence's thunderous frown and Bill and Haney's confused glances. He retreated down the hall and into his study, closing the door quietly behind him. The next few days would be uncomfortable, but then Eddie would leave and he would be free to put his focus where it needed to be. Distractions couldn't be afforded.  
But he felt him, late that night, as he lay in bed and tried to sleep. Eddie had spent the remainder of the day with Haney, the two of them traversing the grounds together despite the dark. Andy had kept his mental distance from them, from all of them. He stayed in his study and occupied himself with letters until everyone retired and the house grew still, then went to his own room. But Eddie was a restless, flickering movement against the edges of his mind. Eventually Andy felt him leave his room and head downstairs. When he realized where he was heading, Andy frowned and got up from his bed.   
He found him in his study, standing in front of the shelves of books that made up one full wall of the space. Eddie turned to look at him, gave him a brief, caustic smile.  
"Figured it was only fair," he said. "You've been all through my mind. This is the closest anyone gets to yours, ain't it." It wasn't a question, and he didn't wait for a response, returning his attention to the shelves. Andy stood near the door and watched him. "Lotta books. Bet you've read every one." He ran a long finger down the spine of one, then pulled it free and flipped it open. "Is that how you tie people to you? Burrow in and uncover everything, learn what they wanna hear from you?" His voice was almost flippant, but his body was a tense line.  
"That's not what happened, Eddie." Andy eased into the room, a few careful steps. "Though I understand why you feel that way. No, I don't typically interact so," he paused. "So completely with a person. Ours was a unique circumstance." Eddie gave a sardonic chuckle.  
"None of the doctors could understand it. Said it was some kinda miracle, that I'd recovered so well. Told me I'd lost some impulse control, but they don't know a damn thing. I've always been reckless." His voice was disconcertingly pleasing, the vowels drawn out long but the pacing still sharp, the inflection rising and falling with an almost musical cadence. "My family thought they'd be getting back a drooling idiot. They were convinced Jesus himself had reached down and fixed my head." He looked over at Andy, the book still held open in his palm. "Suppose I should thank you."   
"You did the work. I simply guided the process."  
"Why?" Eddie closed the book with a snap, turned around to place it back on the shelf. "Took more than a little effort, didn't it? I remember."  
"If you remember, then you know why." Andy started to move around the desk, but Eddie reached his side in two long strides, stopped him with a hard hand on his arm.  
"Don't you sit down across from me," he bit out. "You gonna try and talk me through it, treat me like one of your boys? To hell with that." His mind was a river rapid, clean white water.   
"Alright," Andy said, struggling for calm. He turned to face him, watched him steadily. Eddie dropped his arm.  
"I remember it. I especially remember all the shit you said. I'm sure that don't surprise you." He backed away a step, still watching Andy with keenly intelligent, angry eyes. "Was any of that true?"  
"You know the answer. I couldn't have hidden that from you, not with the link we had established."  
"Then what's this?" Eddie asked, gesturing to the space between them. "It didn't feel like this, before."  
"There's no room for anything more, Eddie. I'm sorry." Andy glanced around the study, all the conversations that had taken place here, the bonds that he had formed and then tested so bitterly. "They intended to twist Bill around on himself, shape him into a weapon. They're still holding three people I love beyond my reach. I won't allow it to continue. I don't have the time for anything else."  
"And after that?" Andy saw and felt what it cost him to ask, to admit that he was willing to wait. He gave a mirthless laugh and leaned against his desk, folded his arms.  
"There's nothing after. It's not a fight that will end in months, or years. It's a struggle that I've given my life to." He looked at Eddie, opened himself to him, let the connection that wanted to spring up so easily between them flow freely. Eddie blinked in surprise and half-lifted a startled hand. "I shouldn't have asked you to come here. It was selfish of me, and short-sighted. A mistake." Eddie's frown deepened. He was remarkable, a swift cascade of piercingly clear thoughts. And beneath all that clever movement he was steady, steady. Andy let the link drop away. "I'm truly sorry."  
"I get it," Eddie said after a long moment. He was still frowning, but it was thoughtful now, the anger draining away. "We all got our battles." He turned towards the door.  
"Eddie." He stopped and looked back. Andy kept himself still against his desk. "It was important to me, too. I had the headache of a lifetime afterwards. It lasted for more than a week, I stumbled around the house with all the curtains closed to try and soothe it." He smiled at him. "It was worth it. Worth that and more. Thank you." Eddie stared at him, Andy could feel the churning motion of his thoughts. He turned and left the room without answering.


	2. Chapter 2

_"I'm tired of talking about myself." Eddie sat up and raised his arms over his head, felt the pleasing stretch of muscles and the faint pop of joints in his shoulders and back. It felt real. It had to be real. Haldane stayed where he was, stretched out along the cool grass. They had been laying there for what felt like hours, Eddie telling story after story, telling his whole life. And the man just listened. He wasn't what Eddie would call talkative, but he never hesitated to speak, and he impressed Eddie each time. He'd never met anyone so self-possessed, so calmly incisive. "A man can only beat his gums for so long before he starts to feel like a puffed up fool, and that feeling's come and gone." He turned and looked down at him. "Let's get you in the hot seat for a bit."_   
_"What would you like to know?" He asked easily. His eyes were half closed, his hands folded across his stomach._   
_"I dunno. What year were you born?"_   
_"Seventeen."_   
_"That explains it." Haldane shot him a questioning look. "Same year as me. Suppose we would have run around together, if we'd happened to grow up in the same area."_   
_"It's a certainty," Haldane agreed without a moment's hesitation. "I would've liked to have known you when I was younger."_   
_"Why's that?"_   
_He shrugged. "I've always gotten along with people, but I wouldn't say I was spoiled for companionship, growing up."_   
_God, there was something about him. "Never had anything serious?" Eddie asked, feeling surprisingly calm. He didn't care if it was real. He didn't care if it wasn't._   
_"No." He frowned softly. "I've had relationships, although it might be a reach to refer to them even as that. Maybe I should call them friendships that quickly found their outer limits."_   
_"Better not. That's a mouthful." Haldane looked at him and smiled slow; all his smiles came slowly and sincerely. "Go to college? You seem the type."_   
_"Do I?" He asked, like he was genuinely surprised. "Yes, I attended for a few years. I never finished. My parents passed away and I returned home and took over their affairs. It had been my plan for several years to form a specialized school for mutants, and once I found myself with an entire estate and fortune at my disposal, I was able to put those plans into motion much earlier than I had anticipated."_   
_"You ever regret not finishing?"_   
_"At times. But knowledge can be gained outside the halls of a university. I don't feel that I've ceased to learn."_   
_"Huh." He had always liked the idea of college, but it hadn't been in the cards for him. He'd enlisted in the Marines as soon as he graduated. At the time it had seemed like the only real option to get him the hell out. And now here he was, sitting in a meadow blanketed in daisies, looking down on the town he had grown up in, far away and perfect as a picture from the bird's eye view that he had of it. Time hadn't dulled any of his memories of the place, but he still missed it._   
_And was he really here? Eddie plucked a flower, tested the feel of the petal between his thumb and forefinger, sniffed it quickly. It seemed real, as real as anything else he had ever experienced, aside from war. Nothing was more real than that. Haldane sat up beside him._   
_"It's real, Eddie," he said. "Anything we experience that evokes thought and feeling is real. I exist, this place exists. We're talking to one another."_   
_"I never had anything either," Eddie said, studying his face carefully. "Anything serious." Haldane looked back at him, warm eyes and a kind expression that didn't do a damn thing to answer the question Eddie was trying to ask. The man didn't leave him with many options. Eddie leaned in slowly and kissed him. His lips were warm and firm, he smelled faintly of ink and mint. He didn't move, kept his hands loose and at his side, but he tilted his head a bit and kissed back. Thank the Lord, Eddie thought, sinking into it. He felt like he'd been dreaming of a moment like this for years, for as long as he'd known longing. It couldn't be real. He felt that same small smile grow against his lips._   
_"Eddie," Haldane said, pulling back, the slightest suggestion of something molten in his voice. "It's real."_

* * *

  
Eddie was up before the sun the next morning. He'd never been the sort to waste the day laying about, and a decade with the Marines had only reinforced the tendency. He dressed and straightened himself, tidied his room and made his way down to the kitchen. Haney was already there, leaning against the counter, drinking coffee and eating a cold biscuit.   
"Skip," he said in greeting, pulling a fresh mug from the cabinet and pouring Eddie a cup.  
"Gonna have to work on that," Eddie said, leaning up beside him and accepting the mug. "We're living in new times. Call me Eddie, or Jones if you'd rather."  
"Like hell," Haney said. "Times ain't that new." Eddie laughed.  
"I guess not." He took a sip of the coffee, glanced around the kitchen. "They keep any honey in this place?"  
Haney grunted and moved to another cabinet, producing a jar. "Head wound's made you soft." Eddie grinned and helped himself to a dollop. Maybe it had, at that. He knew one thing for sure; he was done denying himself little pleasures just to test out what he could take. The coffee was just as strong, but now there was a thrum of sweetness winding through it.  
"What say you show me the rest of the property?" He asked. They had done a little work last night, but it had been too dark to really take in the lay of the land. Haney nodded grimly and they finished their coffees and moved outside.  
The fact that they had some high ground couldn't be entirely discounted, but Eddie doubted it would be a ground assault. And they were isolated. That had its good points, but in general meant that they were removed enough for the attack to take a more aggressive form without having to worry about anyone else witnessing it, telling the story afterwards. The smart move would be to abandon the place, at least temporarily, but Eddie knew that wasn't an option.   
They spent the entire morning and the early afternoon traveling the estate, and then returned to the house. Haney led Eddie around the corner, to a couple of chairs situated in front of one of the house's side entrances. Eddie accepted the cigarette Haney offered him and leaned back in his seat.  
"Well, Gunny. How you think they'll try it?"  
"Something from above, if they're smart. The longer the distance, the better their odds of Haldane not catching it. But they don't comprehend how powerful the man really is. He'll know when it's coming, don't matter how far away they are." Eddie nodded thoughtfully.  
"We're just here for if it all goes south."  
"You got it," Haney said, sucking on his smoke. "It'll be Haldane's fight, and Risely's." He caught Eddie's questioning look. "She's the most powerful of the lot. Would have been a hell of a soldier."  
"You give her any training?" Eddie asked, and Haney snorted.  
"Fuck no." But he got quiet and stared hard out in front of him for a long moment. "Maybe I should."  
"Don't see a good reason not to," Eddie said, thinking back on the mutant women he had encountered on the battlefield. He scanned the treeline, considering their options. "Figure us and Leyden will make ourselves scarce. Lay low and be ready to move if it starts to fall apart. What kind of firearms you got?"  
"My sidearm. Couple of rifles I trained the boys on. Got plenty of ammo." Haney stared at him with flinty blue eyes. "Appreciate it, Captain." Eddie shifted in his seat, uncomfortable under his scrutinous gaze.  
"I owe the man a debt," he said shortly. "Even if I didn't, I'd still show up for you and Leyden." They didn't speak anymore after that, sat together and finished their cigarettes in companionable quiet. Eddie was too warm from walking all morning in the muggy heat, and he was starting to develop a hellish headache besides. The metal plate they'd stuck in his head had made him sensitive to temperature extremes, and he usually tried not to push his luck with the damn thing. But for all that, he felt oddly peaceful. He understood why Haney had chosen to come back here, there was something about the place. Something, hell. It was Andy.  
Despite that, it was already clear to him that he wasn't the only one disturbed by the man's behavior. He couldn't quite put his finger on what it was. He was as steadily quiet and calm as Eddie remembered, his eyes were just as kind and warm. Even last night, giving Eddie the boot, he had been gentle and unflinchingly honest. But there was something closed off, or something let go, and it had thrown a shadow over him, over the whole house. Eddie had seen it in Florence's eyes the night before, and it only became more clear over the next handful of days, as he slowly settled in, caught up with Bill and Haney and got to know Florence, and Haldane continued existing only along the periphery. Eddie scarcely saw him unless in passing, he seemed to spend his days and even some of his nights alone in his study. The man was looking more than a little rough, not that it was Eddie's place to judge. But he'd never had much respect for a man who couldn't keep a tidy appearance. Haldane's hair and clothing were a tousled shambles, and he hadn't taken a razor to his face in weeks.   
One morning, a little over a week after he had first arrived, Eddie walked into the dining room with Haney following behind. Florence was sitting with Bill eating breakfast, and she looked up at him with wide, eager eyes. She had obviously picked up on his intent before he reached her.  
"Well, Miss Risely," he drawled, and grinned as she all but bounced in her seat with anticipation. "How'd you like a lesson in marksmanship?"  
"Oh, call me Flo, please," she said, jumping up and making for the door.  
"A pistol?" She said in surprised disappointment roughly sixty seconds later, as Haney held it out to her. "I thought I would shoot a rifle."  
"We'll get to that as time allows, but a pistol's the smart choice to start you out on. You ain't getting thrown into a war zone, not yet at least." Eddie was standing to the side with his hands clasped behind his back. It was all too familiar, standing back and speaking rarely, while Haney did the hands on work. An officer was only as good as the men he had supporting him, and Eddie had recognized Haney's strengths early on.   
"Pity the fucking army that they put you against," Bill muttered beside him, and Florence threw a smug, grateful smile his way.   
"Keep quiet over there," Haney growled. "Not you, Captain." Bill scowled and kept quiet for a full five minutes while Haney walked Florence through assembling and disassembling the piece.   
She had decent aim for a beginner, had a tendency to anticipate the shot but that was normal enough. Eddie stood with Bill and watched Haney fondly. He'd often felt lucky in the quality and pluck of the men he'd served with, but none more so than Haney. Having him at his side throughout the Peleliu campaign and been a godsend.  
Bill looked suddenly over his shoulder and Eddie followed the motion, twisting his torso to glance behind him. Andy was standing there, watching Haney and Florence with a look Eddie would almost describe as foreboding. But his expression cleared when he felt their eyes. He folded his arms and cocked his hip, he had a pleasingly trim build. He wasn't a large man, tall without being bulky, but there was a suggestion of strength to the line of his shoulders, the swell of his chest.  
"You know how to make your presence known," he said to Eddie. He was smiling, but there was a quality to his gaze that put Eddie on edge.  
"That's all Florence," he replied, trying for a bantering tone. Andy's focus didn't shift away like he'd intended it to, just stayed steadily on him, so Eddie tried again. "You want a lesson? Know your way around a pistol?"  
"No, I've never handled a pistol," Andy answered. He was still watching him, but his focus had gone somewhere else. "It would be easy enough to learn. I could pull everything I needed to know from your mind, or Bill's or Haney's. But muscle memory is another matter." He stared thoughtfully at Eddie for a long, uneasy moment, then seemed to come back to himself. "Some other time," he said, turning away and disappearing back into the house. The quiet he left in his wake was heavy, and Eddie made sure to school his expression into neutral lines before turning back to the others.  
That night, Eddie was back on Peleliu.  
His men were scattered all along the rocky hill, and he was yelling orders but his voice was lost to the constant artillery fire pouring down on them. They were falling faster than he could push them forward, but they kept throwing themselves into the singing bullets because he looked them in the eye and told them to. Eddie watched another one fall, screaming out in pain as a bullet caught him in the torso and left him writhing on the blasted out rocks. Eddie turned to the marine beside him, he was watching him with terror. Eddie shouted at him, couldn't hear his own voice but knew he was telling him to get the hell up the ridge. Handing out another death sentence. The boy stared back at him, fear and loyalty, then stood up, and Eddie suddenly couldn't do it anymore. He couldn't look into one more pair of eyes and ask them to die for him, orders and this bloody fucking war be damned. He moved after the marine, to stop him and pull him back down, and a bullet caught him in the ribs.   
He fell back, hand clapping over the spot, hot digging pain, fire beneath his skin. He shouted for the company to pull back, but he still couldn't be heard, those sharp gray peaks had ripped his voice away. He twisted, the pain shooting deeper, looking for the boy, but he was already dead, laying just a few feet away with a shattered helmet, his empty gaze turned toward Eddie. He took an excruciating breath to try and yell again, and then another bullet found him, struck him right beneath the sternum. Eddie gave in to the pain, to the scrabbling, throat-clutching sorrow, let his head fall back against the ground and watched his men die around him. These fucking islands, this endless war. He'd always known, always-  
A hand came down over the hole in his chest, the touch seeming to suck the pain away. "Let's get you out of here," a low voice said, and Eddie looked up through streaming eyes at Andy. He was in uniform, the fabric just as worn and torn as Eddie's own, like he'd known Eddie wouldn't have believed in anything else. His face was dirty, a rifle slung over his shoulder. He wasn't wearing a helmet. Eddie lifted a bloody hand from the wound over his ribs, and Andy took it and hauled him to his feet.   
They stumbled away, down the ridge and through a rocky landscape that seemed to bleed its graphite shades and shift under their feet. Andy kept a firm hand pressed against Eddie's sternum, then slid it over to run slowly along his ribs. Eddie leaned into him, into his touch, the pain numbing and eventually disappearing completely under his hand. New colors started to spring up, took shape and solidified, and they came to a fumbling halt outside Eddie's tent on Pavuvu. Eddie was still sagging against him, Andy still had one arm wound around his waist and another around his shoulder. The camp was busy with the movement and rough talk of fellow marines, but nobody seemed to notice the two of them standing there. Eddie's breath was coming hard and shuddery; he looked around the camp and felt the outrage kick in, pushing out the relief and lingering fear.   
He shrugged out of Andy's hold, clenching his fists briefly to try and calm his shaking. "You got no goddamn right," he grated out between his teeth, not looking at him. He knew now it was just another dream, not so different from any of the dreams that plagued his sleep on occasion, but he checked himself anyways, pulled up his ripped shirt and ran his hands along his untorn flesh.   
"I'm sorry," Andy said. "I wouldn't usually." He stopped, shifted closer to Eddie but didn't touch him. "Nightmares often serve a purpose. Help us confront ourselves, or provide an outlet to release emotions we can't let ourselves feel in our waking hours. But you were tormenting yourself, Eddie. There was no other purpose."  
"Hell." There was no way in hell he was going to stand here and have his own mind explained to him by some damned almost-lover. Eddie pressed the heel of his hand hard against his forehead. "It's just a fucking dream."  
"But the pain is real. Eddie." He touched him, a hand at his side, another on the base of his neck. Eddie held himself stiff, his chest a tumult of conflicted inclinations. He ought to haul off and punch the man across the jaw, working his way in where he wasn't invited, peeling away at his rawest, ragged edges. He ought to let himself enjoy it, Lord, he was longing for a kind touch. He ought to go back to his men. If this pain was real then they were too, real enough. Andy made a sound of murmured disapproval and stepped in against him. "That's enough," he said firmly, spanning his hand along the back of Eddie's neck. Eddie let his head drop down, knocking clumsily against Andy's cheek and temple. He felt the scratch of Andy's stubble along the side of his face, felt the rough drag of it against his skin as Andy turned his head and pressed his lips against his jaw. Eddie shifted restlessly, not sure if he wanted to pull away or push in closer, and Andy started tracking his way down.   
The man was good, slow and methodical as he scraped his chin along Eddie's throat, then followed the rough touch with a warm mouth and the occasional satiny sweep of his tongue. The hand on his waist moved down to grip Eddie by his hip, shift him in closer. There was something gently commanding in the hold he kept on him, it made Eddie want to moan almost as much as it irritated him. He was always a step removed, controlled and collected while Eddie was burning. He wondered what it would take to make a man like Andy burn hot, fall to pieces. Jesus, he'd like to be the one to do it to him. Andy gave a deep, rumbling groan and tilted Eddie's chin up to kiss the tender spot beneath it.  
"Eddie," he muttered, and Eddie did let loose a sound at that, hearing Andy say his name with a voice gone to gravel. "Come to my bedroom."  
Fucking Christ. "Why?" He tried to get a hold of his spinning thoughts. "This ain't real enough for you? After all that smart talking you did."  
"I want both. God." His hand tightened on the back of Eddie's neck, he skimmed his teeth along Eddie's jaw.   
"You don't got time for distractions. What's this about?"  
"Desire?" Andy suggested, his voice darkly amused against Eddie's ear. "I'm a man like any other. You know that. Who would know it better than you?"  
Eddie didn't know him at all. But he knew himself, knew he couldn't afford this. "No," he said evenly, and Andy stilled against him, his hands loosening. "I'm not looking for that. I can pick that up anywhere. So could you." He unwound his arms from Andy's waist, he hadn't even realized he'd been holding on to him. He stepped back and Andy let him go. "I didn't come here to scratch an itch, and I didn't come for your goddamn help." He glared at him, tipped his chin down. "I want you outta my head."  
Andy watched him, something openly conflicted in his gaze, the most perturbed Eddie had ever seen him. Then he smiled, a fleeting, rueful twitch of his lips. "Of course. I shouldn't have intruded." He stepped back and Eddie made to turn towards his tent and bumped his head against the wall along his bed instead.  
"Shit," he cursed breathlessly, disoriented and aroused. He hit the wall angrily, turned back the other way and glared out into the dark shadow of his room. His cock was crying for attention, but Eddie wasn't about to touch himself when there was the slightest chance that Haldane would pick up on it. He'd only be able to think about one thing if he did, anyways. Eddie gritted his teeth and wrapped his arms tight around his own ribs to keep them from drifting.  
He was in a foul mood the next morning, but he dressed himself carefully neat and walked the grounds until his jaw unclenched. By the time he returned to the house he felt close to even-keeled. He spent the morning shooting targets with Bill and Florence and the afternoon re-walking the property with Haney, evaluating lines of sight and fall back positions. They walked inside with the sun setting low and red at their backs and the sound of music winding its way through the house. Haney muttered under his breath and peeled away, but Eddie followed the drifting sound through the house until he found Bill and Florence in one of the living rooms, standing together by a record player. They were bickering over the records, but stopped and turned when Eddie came into the room.  
"You like it, don't you, Eddie?" Florence asked, referring to the slow song that was currently playing. Eddie leaned against the doorjamb and listened for a moment.  
"Man's got a nice voice," he said eventually, and Bill snorted triumphantly.  
"That means no, in case you're keeping out of his head," he said to Florence.  
"Fine," Florence said, throwing up a hand. "I'll put on another. Will you dance with me, Bill?" She pulled out a new record, lifted the needle up.  
"No," Bill said incredulously, tossing himself backwards onto the sofa.  
She changed the record out anyway, cast a sly glance over her shoulder at Eddie as she lowered the needle back down. "What about you?"  
Eddie started to decline, but then the music started up, a piano played just right, hot and fast. He listened for a moment, felt it begin to work its way through him. "Why, I think you might of been in my head after all," he said, smiling despite himself.  
"I can't help but pick up some things here and there," Florence answered mischieviously. "Do you Eastern Swing?"  
"You'll have to remind me of the steps," Eddie said, joining her in front of the record player. He'd always had a weakness for a good tune, never could resist an offer to dance when the rhythm was lively. It had never mattered much what type of music it was, so long as it got his foot to tap along. He grinned down at Florence as they pulled apart, then reeled back in. "Don't think I've danced since Melbourne."  
"Funny," she said, grinning back. "Neither have I." They went on dancing, Eddie caught halfway between the present and the past. Melbourne had been a good time. The locals had been welcoming, the beer and liquor had flowed, and he'd wound up spending a memorable weekend with a fellow from Australia's 9th. That had been the last time for him. He'd recently been commissioned, and had made sure to keep himself on the straight and narrow from that point on. A bit of fun wasn't worth a blue slip.   
The song ended and Eddie dropped his arm from around Florence's waist. "Another," she said decisively, turning back to the record player.   
"Leyden, dance with the lady," Eddie said, turning away. "Lord knows you could probably use a lesson." Bill protested, but Eddie didn't take in what he said, because he'd looked towards the door and spotted Haldane.  
A shot of heat moved through him at the sight of him, left him flustered, frustrated. Eddie didn't pride himself on much, but he'd never been one to fumble when caught unawares, and he was unnerved by his own quick reaction to the man. He knew he was frowning, looked away to try and clear his expression.  
"Andy, you've shaved," Florence exclaimed, and Eddie looked back again.  
That explained it. It was like being slung back in time, to that hazy, hateful confusion he'd been wandering through when Andy had found him. He looked just like he had then, a smooth square jaw and an unwavering gaze, hair neatly combed. Eddie glared at him. _What the hell are you playing at?_ He threw the thought out.  
 _I just wanted to see my own chin again, Eddie. There's nothing clever behind it._  
 _I'm not a goddamn fool._ But he was. Why the hell was he still here? It had been a mistake to come, and it had been a mistake to stay, to think he'd be able to keep a cool head.  
"Come help me with dinner, Bill," Florence said suddenly behind him.  
"Sure, alright," Bill muttered, voice thick with discomfort. Eddie watched the two of them slink from the room like children dismayed at the sight of their parents acting witless.  
Andy stepped into the room to let them pass, waited until the sound of their footsteps faded to speak. "It wasn't my intention to upset you. I wanted to apologize for my behavior last night." That low voice of his, that quiet sincerity. "You were right. I shouldn't have interfered, and I certainly shouldn't have implied that I think of you as a mere means to physical satiation." He settled himself against the arm of the couch. "You don't need my help, Eddie. I know that. You're the most self-sufficient man I've ever known. But a person can accept help without needing it. I hope you feel that you can turn to me for that, despite our circumstance."  
"Is that what you need?" Eddie asked slowly, watching him. "Someone to offer to help you?" He watched Andy's eyes change, a flicker of surprise, a clouding of uncertainty. Eddie felt a tightening somewhere below his sternum. "Andy," he said, stepping closer. "Do you want my help?"  
"No," Andy answered after a moment. His jaw was grimly set, his words seemed to have to work their way past stiff lips. "I need it."


	3. Chapter 3

_"Tell me about your boys."_   
_"You know them nearly as well as I do." Better, in some ways. Andy felt it press down on him, his great relief that the five of them had ended up with this man, even-handed and courageous. And the overwhelming bitterness, the knowledge that he'd put them in danger in all its forms, not just physical. Their minds were at risk, their hearts and souls. And he'd asked them to do it. But he set that thought aside for later. He was flagging, and strong emotions left unchecked could have drastic effects here._   
_"Don't know much about them at all, 'sides what a man learns about any of his soldiers after seeing them in combat." They were walking the deck of a ship, the ocean green and calm around them. The boat was shifting with the motion of the water, but even that was gentle, muted. It was all Eddie's doing. Andy had been gradually giving control back to him as they went on. The man still had a long road in front of him, but his mind was strong. That and the exercises Andy had taken him through, the pathways they had rebuilt together, would be more than enough to see him fully recovered, with time. "Tell me where you all are from. I had orders not to get overly familiar with them." Andy could feel the edge along the thought, how the orders had sat wrong with him from the very first, but he had always toed the line, lived strictly by their code._   
_"They're from across the nation, I'm sure that was clear from the first. They came to me for various reasons. Stayed for each other." He thought about Romus and Merriell, his first students. They had shown up within a few weeks of one another. Romus, reticent and stiltedly polite, an off-color strip of cloth wound tight around his eyes, had been dropped off by a loving but frustrated father who didn't know what to do with a next to blind mutant son, a boy who couldn't contribute to keeping his family housed and fed. Merriell had appeared in the middle of the night, alone and too-thin, his thoughts buried deeply away where they couldn't hurt him, so that he looked and felt to Andy like nothing but bones and black misery. They had moved about the house like a set of stray cats, half-tamed and on edge. Andy had done little more than speak gently and see to their physical comforts. Then, quite suddenly, they latched on to one another, and that was when Andy's work truly began._   
_"And where are you?" There was no hesitation in the question, no fear. They were past that now. They had left it with that one kiss, sitting side by side with their knees knocking together, their shoulders brushing. Now Eddie's forearm briefly touched his own as they walked along the deck. It felt achingly right. Andy had always felt whole and complete unto himself, and yet it felt right. He wavered under a surprisingly strong punch of euphoria, relief. He knew he was becoming giddy with exhaustion, but God. To find the right one, in this wide, wide world. "What's wrong?" Eddie asked, stopping suddenly. He was sensitive to Andy now, it wasn't something that Andy had intended to happen, but it wasn't unexpected, considering everything they had shared._   
_"I think it's time for us to go our separate ways," Andy said slowly. He had stayed too long, far longer than was necessary to start Eddie along the road to healing. Several hours had passed in the physical world, and those hours were nothing compared to the time they had spent together in Eddie's mind._   
_"We can only go so far when we're ship-side," Eddie joked uneasily. Andy smiled, turned to look out at the glass-green sea. Eddie's sense of self and reality was strong, so strong that he had never truly believed Andy's attempts to reassure him that he was experiencing something beyond a dream. He would be disoriented when he woke up, and peevish, if Andy knew him at all. And he did know him._   
_"You're aboard a ship," he answered. "I'm not. I'm in my home in Massachusetts." Even thinking about his physical body was enough to start to pull him back, and Eddie made a startled sound in his throat and grabbed him by the shoulder. Andy anchored himself deep into the water, then reached a hand up and set it on top of Eddie's own. "Believe me, I'd stay longer if I could. This has been." He stopped, struggled against himself. He could feel his own emotions trying to batter their way through, but this was Eddie's space, Eddie's mind. "This has been more than I expected to be given." Eddie didn't say anything, but he stepped closer, curled his arm around Andy's shoulders. Andy would have liked to kiss him again, but knew that would be too much._   
_"What is that?" Eddie asked. He was looking out at the leaden blue sky, brow furrowed. "Feels like a storm."_   
_"That would be me," Andy answered wryly. He didn't have to look at him to know the fierce frown that was being directed his way. "Can I give you something?" He asked, turning towards him. Eddie stared at him, then nodded once. He was so close, it would only take the smallest movement to lean in and brush their lips together. But what he needed now was distance, before his control collapsed in on itself completely. Andy stepped away, keeping his grip on Eddie's hand and wrist. Touch wasn't necessary, but he'd discovered that the other person typically found it reassuring. More than that, he wanted to keep touching him. He settled the knowledge gently inside Eddie, watched his frown deepen, his gaze turn inward. "There. Now you'll know where to go, if you decide that you want to find me. Thank you, Eddie. If we don't speak again, this will be a cherished memory. But I hope to see you again." He let go, took a step back. "Come visit me. Please."_   
_"This ain't real," Eddie said, watching him closely. One hand drifted over to rub distractedly at his wrist._   
_"You're a stubborn man," Andy said, barely managing to keep a sober expression. "It's real. You're right through that door." Eddie turned in surprise and stared at the door that Andy had moved them to, the door leading to the sick bay. "Go in and see for yourself." Eddie shot him one last burning, doubting look, then turned towards the doorway, and Andy let him go._

* * *

  
Andy didn't know his own mind anymore.  
Perhaps he'd been devoting too much of his time to tracking through the thoughts of others. It was how he spent his days now, digging through the minds of powerful men, powerful in one sense of the word at least, gathering information. Perhaps he'd done it frequently enough for their thoughts to start influencing his own. It had been an issue in his youth, when he was still new to his powers. The minds of others had layered endlessly on top of him, until he was suffocated and lost beneath them. Recently, Andy felt like he was drowning under a similar weight, a stranger to himself. He hadn't understood his motivations when he'd inserted himself into Eddie's dream, and he certainly hadn't been in his right mind when he'd propositioned him afterwards. Eddie had shown him the door, the least that Andy deserved, and Andy had left his bed, gone to his bathroom for a cold shower. He'd flicked on the light and stared at the face in the mirror. He hardly recognized that, either.  
He made it a point to hold himself back from Eddie's mind, but he'd still felt the faint stain of displeasure that rippled through the other man whenever they crossed paths and Eddie took in his appearance. It had nothing to do with vanity or frivolity on Eddie's part. When his thoughts were dark and he felt distant from himself and the standard of integrity that he held to, Eddie always took the time to clean himself, straighten his appearance. Even in the midst of a campaign, if he felt himself turning too hard and cruel, his humanity teetering on that sharp edge that every soldier walked, he reclaimed himself with some small act of ablution. He washed his face, his hands, patched the holes and tears of his uniform. For Eddie, is was a matter of self-respect, and respect for the people around him.  
Maybe that was why he grabbed the razor. Andy didn't know who he was doing it for, didn't know who he was doing any of it for. Would it really benefit mutants, this coming confrontation with his nation's most powerful? Perhaps, but Andy wasn't prescient, couldn't possibly predict all the potential ramifications. But could he lay the safety and security of the people he loved down against that uncertainty? To imagine for even a moment that their lives could be measured in that way and found to be less than worthy of his most dire actions was appalling. But who would he become, who was he becoming? Not the man he'd hoped to be, not a man who deserved the love and loyalty he'd been given. Not a man that Eddie could ever respect.  
He'd never felt so numb, emotionally and physically, as he had when he'd looked at Eddie and admitted the truth. And when Eddie had only clapped him on the shoulder and told him in an easy tone of voice to come along to the kitchen and get something to eat, Andy had followed after him, reverberations of shock moving through him. He'd closed his mind up tight against Florence's concerned probing, managed to make simple conversation throughout the quiet, uncomfortable meal. After, not knowing what else to do, he'd stood up and said his goodnights and retreated to his bedroom.   
He felt Eddie downstairs, it was impossible to not be aware of that bright movement, felt him helping Florence straighten up the kitchen, sitting outside and enjoying a cigarette with Haney. Then he came inside and made straight for Andy's study. Andy huffed a breath of surprised amusement, and headed for the stairs.  
This time when he walked in, he found Eddie behind his desk, leaning back in his seat with his elbows settled along the arms of the chair. He grinned at Andy when he stepped through the doorway, that sharp smile of his. "Can't claim to be as clever as you, but I'll give it my best shot. Sit down."  
"Most psychoanalysis ends up being a wasted effort, despite its good intentions," Andy said. But he took a seat.  
"Psychoanalysis." Eddie repeated the word thoughtfully. "Is that what you do, when you help somebody?"  
"No. I've never felt it was my place to determine what qualifies as right or wrong in another's mind. In general, my aim has been to provide them a safe space to think and talk about whatever they wish to. If I felt them circling around a difficult subject, I would try to help them find a different way to approach it."   
"Alright, then." Eddie gestured with his hand. "Go on and open that channel."  
"Channel?"  
"Like before. So I can feel you, and you can feel me." Andy frowned and sat back in his seat. The chair was uncomfortable, why had no one ever told him how uncomfortable the chair was? "Not gonna feel safe if you don't know how I feel about you." Eddie looked startled by his own words. "About whatever you choose to talk about, I mean." Andy hesitated, but really, what was the purpose in struggling against something that he wanted, truly wanted? He watched Eddie closely as he reopened the link, formed nearly a year ago and continuing unbroken between them ever since. Eddie's face didn't change, but he cocked his head to the side as if picking apart a complicated tune. "You are afraid," he said, surprised.   
"Not of you," Andy tried to assure him. It was good, feeling him again, tenacity and courage and nimbleness of thought.  
"But you're lying." Eddie frowned at him, his bright eyes and his focused mind holding Andy in place. "You think I'd think less of you because you're struggling? Christ, Andy. If you're not struggling against something, you ain't living. You're just a man, isn't that what you keep telling me?"  
"You already think less of me." It was his own doing, keeping him at a distance and inviting him to come closer in all the wrong ways.  
"I don't," Eddie said swiftly, then stopped and thought hard, churning white water. "I don't," he said again, more slowly. "No such thing as a perfect soul in this world. We have to look to each other to keep from straying. You haven't had anyone to lean on, but that's what I want-" His lips tightened and he looked away, suddenly flustered. "What I came here for. I'm not looking for some idol to follow after. I want something equal, with some give and take. Something real." He looked back at Andy. "You kept telling me it was real."  
God, he was brave. Andy couldn't claim to have been lonely, not living as he did in a house full of people he knew and loved, not with the constant awareness of life that had always been the ultimate grace behind his gift. But for all that, he'd never dared to share his doubts, his misgivings. It wouldn't have been fair to them, to the people who relied on and looked to him. But Eddie didn't need him. Eddie wanted, and was fearless enough to say it.  
"I can't continue this way, Eddie." He'd known it from the beginning, but hadn't been able to say it, hadn't had anyone to say it to. "There's a man that could make these cruel choices, view people as chess pieces, their minds as commodities. I can't become that man. But I have to, in order to win a future for my kind." Eddie looked down at the desk. His hand drifted up towards the knotted flesh over his forehead, his fingers tracing idly along the scar lines.  
"I know what you mean," he said shortly. "Found myself there all the time. I'd look around and not understand how the hell I got where I was, how I managed to," he paused, dropped his hand and tapped his fingers restlessly against the desk. "To do the things I was called to do." He shook his head jerkily. "I like to think I found my way back each time, but maybe I didn't. Some things you gotta give a part of yourself up for. When you don't leave anything behind, when it don't touch you anymore, that's when you've really lost yourself."  
"And yet you're whole," Andy said. Complete, perfectly imperfect. "How is that so, if you've had to leave parts of yourself behind?"  
"I dunno." He leaned forward, propped his elbows on the desk. He was looking somewhere over Andy's shoulders, seeing past horrors. Andy saw them too. "Went on caring about people, I guess. Went on finding meaning in the little things. You gotta keep a whole heart somehow, if you're gonna go on breaking it."  
"Yes," Andy said in agreement. He could feel Eddie's certainty, even if his words had been hesitant. "It has to stay broken, doesn't it. You're right." Anything worth fighting for required hard choices, decisions that would haunt him. He could only measure himself by the people who stood with him, by whether or not he continued to feel the painful weight of those decisions. He looked at Eddie, a new surge of pressing questions rising up. What sort of man would Eddie choose to stand beside? It wasn't Eddie's fight, but would he consider staying with him despite that? Could he find meaning here, would he let Andy try to give him, give him-  
Eddie smiled abruptly. "You're a bit slow on the uptake, aren't you? Suppose it's 'cuz you're not the sort to dig in and look, even though you could." He leaned back in Andy's seat, tapped his chest. "I like this. Feeling you think. It's like a storm, you know? Warm rain, that feeling the air takes on. Don't close it."  
"I'll leave it open as long as you want me to," Andy said. Vowed. He suddenly wanted very much to touch him. He suddenly very much liked the sight of Eddie in his chair, in his most personal space. He wanted to keep him there, hold him there. Eddie's smile grew fierce.  
"You think too much, that's half your problem," he said. He settled his arms along the sides of the chair, tipped his chin up challengingly. He was swift movement, a firm rock bed beneath.   
Andy stood up. His heart, for all its rising need, was beating steadily in his chest. He circled around the desk and Eddie watched him, his smile gone, his eyes intent. He stepped between the chair and the desk, Eddie shifting to accommodate him until Andy was standing between his knees, looking down on him. He reached out, traced his fingers lightly along the knuckles of Eddie's hand. "Eddie-"   
_It's not right - Shut the fuck up, Reynolds has got the radio on - The man's a threat to the nation, Webb, what the hell else do you need to know - Not even a man, is he. He's a mutant - We got laws against doing shit like this on national soil. We got - Jesus, Webb, the fucking radio! Shut up!_  
"Andy?" Eddie had turned his hand palm up, was gripping his fingers.  
_Florence, I need you outside. Now._ He felt her startle awake, felt her quick fear. "Get Bill and Haney," he said to Eddie. "We only have a few minutes." Eddie hesitated for a split second, then nodded and slid to his feet, dropping Andy's hand and moving to the door. Andy followed after him more slowly, solidifying his tenuous grip on the strand of thoughts he had picked up. He had him now, Webb, who didn't care one way or the other about mutants but could hardly believe he was preparing to do a night drop on an American citizen. Andy rooted his way into his mind, learning the mission, his companions. God, he'd almost been too late, distracted by his conversation with Eddie. But it wasn't too late, he could practically hear Eddie's voice saying exactly that to him. A near miss was not a miss. And it wasn't possible to regret their conversation. He stepped outside and moved into the courtyard so he could peer up at the night sky, scattered all through with stars.  
Florence appeared at his side, disheveled and pajama-clad, but wide awake and alert. Andy put a hand on her shoulder, shared his awareness of the bombardier's mind. "I'll have the rest of them, as they come closer," he assured her. "It's a half-crew. They wanted to involve as few people as possible. There's no one in the rear compartment." She didn't speak, just raised a hand slowly over her head, fingers splayed wide. Andy could already make out the faint sounds of an approaching aircraft. They were close enough now for him to pick their thoughts apart from all the rest. "Florence," he said, even as he reached out and began winding his way through their minds.  
"I can do it," she snapped, only half believing. She was powerful, indescribably so, and had always sat uneasily with it.  
"I know you can," he said, opening himself so she could feel his utter faith in her abilities. He dropped his hand from her shoulder, stepped back to give her space. The sound was growing louder. Andy kept a light hold on all the crew, but the majority of his focus was on the bombardier. He felt him turning his focus to his work, pushing away the doubt. The plane closed in on them, the roaring rattle of the engines, high enough to still be impossible to see in the dark. Andy was only able to pick it out by a gleam of silver, by how it blocked the stars. _Now_ , he told Florence.  
Florence's free hand punched up, her body mimicking the actions of her mind, and the shrieking sound of tearing metal filled the air above them even as flames burst to life over their heads, the incendiary bombs that had been dropped impacting against the shield Florence had erected. She splayed the fingers of her other hand, reinforcing the shield, as the fire caught on itself and burned brighter, illuminating the plane as it disappeared over the trees, the tail ripped away. Andy could feel the crew, their fear rising up to seize them.  
_A perfect strike, Florence. The crew is unharmed. If you can spare a bit of your focus, perhaps you can calm the pilot. He's beginning to panic, and I'm concerned he won't be able to land the aircraft without your aid_. He fed her a link to the pilot's mind, felt her falter, then steel herself. She reached out, soothing the boy's fear and instilling him with confidence, all while hold her burning shield firmly in place. _Florence_. Andy didn't try to hide his pride, his open admiration. _You're a marvel_. She looked over her shoulder at him, spared him a wide, shaky smile.  
Half an hour later, they pulled to the side of the road and started making their way across a field, towards the wreckage of the plane. Andy was having to maintain several layers of control, holding the flight crew passively in place and convincing the people in the surrounding area to stay in their beds and not investigate the crash, and so he hadn't been able to give his attention to much else aside from their immediate concerns. But Eddie had reached for his hand as he drove Andy to the crash site, and Andy had taken it, stroked his thumb soothingly along his palm. Bill and Haney were following behind in the other car.  
The plane was fortunately not ablaze, but Andy still felt a spike of anxiety from Eddie as he climbed up into the fuselage and made his way to the front compartment. He went to the radio and slipped the headphones over his head.   
"Redbud, verify mission status, over." A pause. "Redbud, nothing heard. Acknowledge, over." Andy picked up the mouthpiece and pressed down on the button that would allow him to transmit.  
"This is Andrew Haldane speaking. Please relay to the lieutenant general that I've recovered his crew. If he would like them returned, he's welcome to stop by for them."  
The sun was just starting to rise when the line of black cars started wending their way up towards the house. Andy stood on the front porch with Florence beside him and watched them pull to a stop, watched the men pour out. As if there was safety from him in numbers, as if he hadn't been following their progress to his door for the last fifty miles. Eddie and Haney had taken Bill and retreated into the trees hours ago. Andy wasn't willing to risk Bill in an interaction with the men who had been responsible for his capture. The lieutenant general was the last to emerge, a man of not inconsiderable height, hale and broad-shouldered despite his age. Andy stepped down off the porch to meet him, ignoring the many hands shifting towards weapons. The lieutenant general watched him approach, hard, clever eyes.   
"Welcome to my home, Lieutenant General," Andy said pleasantly, offering his hand. The man stared at him for several long seconds, then shook it, as Andy had known he would. He had too much respect for pluck to not acknowledge the gesture. "You'll find your flight crew inside. They're all fine, a little rattled, but I was able to keep them calm." He smiled briefly, let the man stew on that for a moment. "You want to keep this short, as do I. Will you walk with me?" He gestured toward the gardens.   
"Voss, Collier," the lieutenant general said curtly, and two men peeled away from the rest and came to stand behind him. Florence kept her place beside Andy, and the five of them set off at a sedate pace. "Well, Haldane. You obviously want to bargain. What do you have to offer?"  
"What we all want, Lieutenant General. Peace." Andy kept the bitter amusement firmly hidden away, felt the thrum of Eddie's shocked delight at his words. But the man was smart, a mind of steel and sharp teeth. He knew he was being mocked. His face didn't change, but something in him reared back, ready to strike. Andy continued on, kept his gaze level and calm. "I'm offering you a coveted position in history. The chance to be one of the few nations to emerge from the war without this stain on your conscience." He felt his interest catch. "The stories are already horrendous, aren't they? What's been done to my kind, to so many oppressed, in the name of war and power. I won't let those stories fade away. I intend to ensure that the world remembers how brutally we were used. America doesn't have to enter into that story."  
"You haven't offered me anything I haven't already considered," the lieutenant general said. "We've already weighed those risks. Removing you remains the simplest solution."  
"You've brought enough men, you could certainly kill me," Andy lied. Not with Florence at his side, not with Bill and Haney and Eddie waiting in the wings. "But I think you'd soon discover the price I exact to be painfully high."  
"The vengeance of your followers?" He scoffed.  
"No. The death of your grandson." His face paled, his eyes grew wide. The threat of some pains were sometimes as dearly felt as the actual blow. "He's with your wife as we speak, isn't he? But Beth is in the kitchen, on a phone call. A child's mind is a wonder; they're so open, so willing to experience anything new and untried. It would only take the slightest suggestion, and he'd go down the hallway to your room. Open your nightstand, pull out that service revolver that Beth keeps telling you to lock up."  
"You son of a bitch-" He started to growl.  
"Don't be hasty, Voss," Andy said, turning towards the man as he started to pull his pistol free. "Sara's life is precariously balanced as well. She gets sad so easily, and you circle around her, resent and love her and loathe yourself for not being enough to make her happy." He smiled at him gently. "And she loves you, but the world can lay so heavily on her some days. It's not even a suggestion, for a person like your wife. She's already thought about it." He turned back to the lieutenant general, kept his tone cool, his expression affable. "I have them in my thoughts, and more besides. You think I don't know you intimately, know all of you? But I don't want it to come to that."  
It was all a bluff, of course. He didn't have a hold of the lieutenant general's grandson or Voss' wife, and wouldn't harm an innocent even if he did. But it was an easy matter to look into their thoughts, pull out their greatest loves and weaknesses to use against them. And Florence stood at his shoulder and encouraged their fear with a deft touch.  
"What do you want?" The lieutenant general grated out, his face florid now.  
"I want Romus Burgin, Merriell Shelton and Eugene Sledge returned to me. I want my school and my students left alone." Andy lifted his hands. "That's all I ask. Those are my terms." He shifted his weight and channeled Eddie's perfectly set, defiant chin. "Do you agree to them?"  
They left shortly after, the flight crew in tow. Andy stood in the doorway and watched them leave. Nothing was settled, indeed, this had only been the opening shot. But he had won a measure of safety, and he could live with the regrets of the day. He closed the door.  
That night, Andy walked down a grassy slope and found Eddie standing in a creek bed.   
It had been a full day, after the lieutenant general and his entourage left the estate. A day spent swinging back and forth between bubbling relief and sobering conversations. Andy had taken the time to check in with all of them, except for Eddie, who's steadiness Andy could feel along the link they shared. Though the five of them did little more than wander back and forth between one another, the day seemed to pass in a blur of fatigued feeling. Andy had been awake for nearly two full days by the time he stumbled heavy-footed to his bed. And yet as soon as his head hit his pillow, as soon as sleep dragged him under, he found his way to Eddie.  
He had rolled his pant legs up to keep them from the water, even in a dream Eddie would take that sort of care. His curls were short and neat; Andy thought it might be one of his favorite idiosyncrasies between Eddie in his own mind and Eddie in reality. In reality, Eddie's hair was a mass of wild curls, uncontrollable despite the man's best efforts. Here they were as well-ordered as the rest of him. Andy walked into the water to stand beside him. It was crisply cold, and running fast, the current pulling gently against his calves. Eddie was staring down at the water, frowning softly. Andy took his hand, and Eddie knotted their fingers together.  
Love was a gathering storm, a river that stretched the length of the world, feeding endlessly on itself. "Eddie," he murmured, lifting their hands so he could kiss his fingertips, the flesh at the base of his thumb. "Come to my bedroom."  
Eddie turned to look at him, that keen, discerning gaze. He wasn't a necessity, but a choice, and all the more precious for it. He smiled.  
"No," he said. His eyes were bright, searing blue.  
Andy opened his own eyes, already smiling with amused frustration. He was on his back, his arm splayed out across the bed as if he'd been reaching for something. "Alright," he said to the dark quiet of his room. He got up and made his way through the familiar shadows of his home. The man had traveled far enough to reach him, after all. There should be some give and take.   
He reached for the knob to his door, but it swung open before he could lay his hand to it. Eddie pulled him in, kicked the door shut behind them.

* * *

  
_He didn't want to step down into the water because he knew some things couldn't be washed away, no matter how you might try and give yourself over to it, no matter how long you held yourself in it's cool grip. The water wasn't going to wash away any of the things he had done, no matter how the singing crowd tried to tell him otherwise. The water wasn't going to miraculously make him a good man, a normal man._  
 _He wanted to step down into the water because he remembered the feeling, a hand guiding him down, slipping briefly into a weightless, murmuring world. And then being pulled back up, hands and smiling faces, every soul somehow open and connected in one glorious moment._  
 _But he wouldn't do it. No matter how he longed for another moment like that. There were some things he wouldn't give up, not until they ripped them from his bloody, grabbing fingers. He stared down at the guitar. If he let them try and wash away the night he'd struggled in his hole against that Jap, pinned him and strangled him while he bucked and scrabbled beneath him, watched him die in slow motion, would they also wash away the next day, when Mills had put a gentle hand on his shoulder and set his guitar in his lap and asked him for a song? They had sat together and sang 'We'll Meet Again,' voices ragged and hoarse. Mills died a few days later. Where would it stop, if he let them remove just one painful thing? What sweetness would wash away with it, what the hell would even be left? He wouldn't do it. He reached down and plucked a string, listened to it reverberate._  
 _"Edward?"_  
 _He frowned, glared up at the speaker. No one called him Edward aside from his ma. The man in front of him tilted his head slightly, and smiled. His lips scarcely moved, but his eyes warmed and crinkled._  
 _"Ah," he said. "Eddie." He was handsome, tall and clean-shaven and square jawed. He was watching Eddie with a gentle kind of focus that made him want to clasp his hands carefully controlled behind his back, stand at attention. "I'm Andrew Haldane."_

* * *

  
Andy rolled over and slipped his arm around Eddie's waist, tugged him back against him and buried his nose and mouth against his neck. "What got you thinking about that, so early in the morning?" He murmured, voice gravelly with sleep.  
"Get outta my head," Eddie said, not meaning it, tilting his head back to give Andy greater access. "Can't a man reminisce on the time he met his beau?"  
"Beau?" Andy repeated, low and pleased. His ran his hand along Eddie's torso, a slow trail from his sternum down to his hip bone.  
"Well, what in the hell else should I call you?" Eddie flipped over, pushing Andy's arm down and to the side as he went, until he had him how he wanted, on his back with Eddie over him. Andy went along with it, dropping his head against the pillow and watching Eddie with that look of liquid heat in his eyes that he seemed to reserve for moments like these, when they were alone.   
"I like it," he said. "I'd likely answer to any descriptive you chose to give me." Eddie lowered his head and kissed him, warm lips and the scrape of stubble and the frankly acrid taste and smell of him after just waking up. He was only a man, after all.  
_Lover_ , he thought at him, a wave of devotion and possessiveness washing over him. He felt Andy's lips moving against his own, curling slowly into a smile.  
_Yes_ , he answered. He pushed against Eddie's hold on his arm and Eddie let go, let Andy wrap his arms around him and pull him down against him.   
They stayed like that for a bit, hands moving slowly over each other, muttering endearments and each other's names. But neither of them were the sort to waste the day laying in bed. Eventually Eddie reached down, squeezed Andy's side. "C'mon," he said, planting one last kiss against his shoulder. "Get up. I'll make you some breakfast."  
The world had changed in the close to two months that Eddie had been at the estate. Japan had surrendered, the war had finally ended. Seemed like half the damn planet was in ruins, but people couldn't help but celebrate. And it had changed in other ways too, ways Eddie would have never imagined for himself a year ago. He woke up each morning and immediately turned his head to look at the man sleeping beside him to assure himself it was real. He'd always known, had never doubted, that he would spend his life alone. There wasn't any other option for men like him. And yet, somehow...but it wasn't somehow. It was Andy.   
Eddie hummed under his breath as he helped himself to a mug of coffee, put the kettle on the stove for Andy's tea. He wasn't much in the kitchen but it turned out the folk in this household mainly subsisted on dinners out of a box, and Eddie wasn't living like that. So he fumbled his way through, trying to pick apart the meals his ma used to whip up. So far the only one he'd managed to crack was her cornbread.   
So it would be eggs and toast again this morning, but Eddie didn't expect any complaints. He stood in front of the stove and fried the eggs, handed Andy a cup without looking when he joined him in the kitchen. "Car's gone." He'd noted it when he'd walked by the window.  
"It's Haney. He's been restless lately." Andy poured himself steaming water from the kettle, dropped a bag in to steep. "He'll be back in a few weeks, I'm sure."  
"Least he had the decency to brew a pot before he skipped town on us." Eddie slid the eggs onto their plates and leaned against the counter beside Andy. "He okay?"  
"It's the war." Andy grimaced. "Or the lack of one, I suppose. He doesn't know who to be now, or if it's worthwhile to try and be anything." He must have felt Eddie's growing concern, because he put a hand on his shoulder and squeezed gently. "It's a thought he's been circling for more than a year now. He's decided to confront it. He'll be alright, Eddie. He'll be back."  
"Eat your eggs," Eddie said brusquely, frowning and turning his focus to his plate. Anything to get some of that kind regard off of him. It hit him like that sometimes, a disbelief so strong that he had to struggle against it. But Andy just smiled with his eyes and took a bite of his toast.  
They ate in silence, but even silence between them was a conversation. Eddie could feel Andy's attention turning towards his study and the work waiting there for him. He worked too hard, Eddie had made it his mission to see to it that he didn't spend his days locked up in the damn house. He couldn't stand to be idle himself, and had worried early on that he would end up frittering his days away, but so far he'd found plenty to keep him busy. Risely was coming along nicely in her firearm training, and he, Haney and Leyden had been working on that scrap heap they called a training field. And he helped Andy out where he could, had ended up taking over the majority of his correspondence with the team of chiselers he had handling his money. That was a whole other mess, one Eddie figured he'd be digging his way through for the next several months.  
It was nice, this wordless communication between them. Hell, nice didn't begin to describe it. Eddie knew the shape of Andy's thoughts somewhere outside of language or even image, knew them like faint echoes of his own half-formed thoughts. It was a pressure like changing weather, like feeling a heart beating steadily beneath his hand. So when the pressure increased, when the heart suddenly started beating double time, Eddie looked up from his coffee in surprise, shifted his stance and looked quickly around the room, trying to find the source of Andy's distress. "What?" He asked, turning so that he stood at Andy's shoulder.  
"It's Jay," Andy said, and Eddie felt the heavy crush of relief and guilt come down on him. "He's on his way here."  
"'Bout damn time," Eddie said, watching him, striving for a light tone. They hadn't talked about it, but they hadn't needed to. Andy didn't say anything, just turned against the counter and crossed his arms, hands tucked against his sides. Eddie braced his hand on the counter behind him, drummed his fingers restlessly, trying to think what to say. "He doesn't hate you," he said eventually. "He wouldn't be coming back if he hated you."  
"I don't know what I can say to him, Eddie." Andy shook his head. "I've made so many mistakes."  
"You'll know, when he gets here," Eddie assured him. It was just the truth. Andy didn't know how else to speak besides from the heart. Folk were helpless against it, or Eddie was at least. Lord, he'd follow the man anywhere, and happily. He planned on doing just that. Andy looked at him, his eyes warming.   
"Eddie," he said, low and deep. He set his hands on Eddie's side, shifting him in closer and kissing him. Eddie gave himself over to it, pressed their hips together and gripped Andy by his shirt. They pulled apart after a long moment, and Eddie settled his forehead against Andy's cheek.   
"How far out is he?" He asked, kissing his jaw.  
"About an hour." Andy was holding him in place, but loosely. That stormy feeling was still there, but some of the urgency had abated.   
"Let's go for a walk," Eddie said, stepping back and tugging on Andy's shirt. "Fresh air will do us both some good while we wait."   
Andy made a low sound of agreement and made for the door. Eddie trailed after him as they moved through the house, watching him. The way he walked, his easy confidence, the quiet that seemed to follow him. Andy stopped at the front door and looked back at him. He tilted his head just slightly, waited silently until Eddie came to stand beside him. "Want you next to me," he said simply once Eddie reached his side. Eddie fought against a grin, and reached around him to open the door for them both.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Confession: over the course of writing this story, I transformed into a monstrous Andy/Eddie fan. It's bad, people. Thanks for reading!


End file.
